History of the Bautzen Memorial

In 1992 the Bautzen II prison was closed because of its particular political significance. Thanks to the initiative and unrelenting commitment of Bautzen-Komitee e.V. (Bautzen Committee), the organisation of former Bautzen prisoners founded in 1990, the Saxon state legislature resolved in June 1993 to establish a memorial.

The Saxon parliament stipulated that 'while preserving the authenticity of the historical location, portions of the former Bautzen II prison shall be made a site commemorating and recollecting the victims of politicised criminal justice in the two Bautzen prisons'. The Bautzen Memorial has thus been given the comprehensive and very difficult task of documenting at a single historical site the history of two very different detention centres during three periods of persecution: the Third Reich, the period of Soviet occupation and the SED dictatorship.

Since 1994 the memorial has operated under the auspices of the Saxon Memorial Foundation dedicated to the memory of the victims of political dictatorship. The staff of the memorial, working in close cooperation with the Bautzen Committee, are currently creating the permanent exhibition covering the three topics mentioned above. In recognition of Bautzen's pivotal role as a site of political persecution, the Bautzen Memorial is financed in part by federal funding and in part by the Free State of Saxony.